Guest and Restricted Users Can Delete Items on the All Users Desktop After Windows XP Upgrade (298312)

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
Microsoft Windows XP Professional

This article was previously published under Q298312

SYMPTOMS

After you upgrade a computer to Windows XP from Microsoft Windows Millennium Edition (Me) or from Microsoft Windows 98 or Windows 98 Second Edition, a guest (or any restricted user) can delete files and folders that reside on the All Users desktop.

CAUSE

This behavior can occur because of limitations of the FAT (file allocation table) and FAT32 file systems.

RESOLUTION

To resolve this behavior, use the Convert.exe utility to update the computer's file system to NTFS.

For detailed information about how to covert the system to NTFS, refer to the following Microsoft Knowledge Base articles:

214579 How to Use Convert.exe to Convert a Partition to NTFS

237399 Default NTFS Permissions Not Applied to Converted Boot Partition

156560 Free Space Required to Convert FAT to NTFS

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article.

MORE INFORMATION

By default, security is set so that guests do not have Delete access to NTFS volumes.

For a description of the FAT and FAT32 file systems, refer to the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

154997 Description of the FAT32 File System

Modification Type:	Major	Last Reviewed:	11/9/2001
Keywords:	kbenv kbpolicy kbprb KB298312